Christian Life
They Receive the Gospel
…and the poor have the gospel preached to them. – Matthew 11:5
I had an engraving sent to me the other day which pleased me beyond measure. It was an engraving simply but exquisitely executed. It represented a poor girl in an upper room, with a lean-to roof. There was a post driven in the ground, on which was a piece of wood, standing on which were a candle and a Bible. She was on her knees at a chair, praying, wrestling with God. Everything in the room had on it the stamp of poverty. There was the mean coverlet to the old stump bedstead; there were the walls that had never been papered, and perhaps scarcely whitewashed. It was an upper story to which she had climbed with aching knees, and where perhaps she had worked away till her fingers were worn to the bone to earn her bread at needlework. There it was that she was wrestling with God. Some would turn away and laugh at it; but it appeals to the best feelings of man, and moves the heart far more than does the fine engraving of the monarch on his knees in the grand assembly.
True it is, the gospel affects all ranks, and is equally adapted to them all; but yet we say, “If one class be more prominent than another, we believe that in Holy Scripture the poor are most of all appealed to.”…we think it rather to be an honour that the poor are evangelized, and that they listen to the gospel from our lips. I have never thought it a disgrace at any time.~ C.H. Spurgeon
https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0114.cfm
Oh! What a Blessed Thing It Is to Be Gospelized!
And He said to them, “Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. – Mark 16:15
Oh! how great a work it is to gospelize any man, and to gospelize a poor man. What does it mean? It means, to make him like the gospel. Now, the gospel is holy, just, and true, and loving, and honest, and benevolent, and kind, and gracious. So, then, to gospelize a man is to make a rogue honest, to make a harlot modest, to make a profane man serious, to make a grasping man liberal, to make a covetous man benevolent, to make the drunken man sober, to make the untruthful man truthful, to make the unkind man loving, to make the hater the lover of his species, and, in a word, to gospelize a man is, in his outward character, to bring him into such a condition that he labours to carry out the command of Christ, “Love thy God with all thy heart, and thy neighbour as thyself.” Gospelizing, furthermore, has something to do with an inner principle; gospelizing a man means saving him from hell and making him a heavenly character; it means blotting out his sins, writing a new name upon his heart-the new name of God. It means bringing him to know his election, to put his trust in Christ, to renounce his sins, and his good works too, and to trust solely and wholly upon Jesus Christ as his Redeemer. Oh! what a blessed thing it is to be gospelized! How many of you have been so gospelized? ~ C.H. Spurgeon
https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0114.cfm
Preaching the Gospel
How beautiful are the feet of them that preach the gospel of peace, and bring glad tidings of good things! – Romans 10:15; Isaiah 52:7
As a good brother said, “The gospel lies in three things, the Word of God only, the blood of Christ only, and the Holy Spirit only.” These three things make up the gospel. “The Bible; the Bible alone is the religion of Protestants; the blood of Christ the only salvation from sin, the only means of the pardon of our guilt; and the Holy Spirit the only regenerator, the only converting power that will alone work in us to will and to do of His good pleasure.” Without these three things there is no gospel. Let us take heed, then, for it is a serious matter, that when the people listen to us that it is the gospel that we preach, or else we may be as guilty as was Nero, the tyrant, who, when Rome was starving, sent his ships to Alexandria, where there was corn in plenty, not for wheat, but for sand to scatter in the arena for his gladiators. Ah! there be some who seem to do so-scattering the floor of their sanctuary, not with the good corn of the kingdom, upon which the souls of God’s people may feed and grow thereby, but with the sand of controversy, and of logic, which no child of God can ever receive to his soul’s profit… Let us take heed that it is the gospel. Hear then, ye chief of sinners, the voice of Jesus. “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptance, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners; of whom I am chief.” “Him that cometh to Me I will in no wise cast out.” “Whosoever believeth and is baptized, shall be saved.” “For the Son of man is come to seek and save that which is lost.”~ C.H. Spurgeon
https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0114.cfm
The Mark of His Gospel
The blind receive their sight, and the lame walk, the lepers are cleansed, and the deaf hear, the dead are raised up, and the poor have the gospel preached to them. – Matthew 11:5
“The poor have the gospel preached to them.” It was so in Christ’s day; it is to be so with Christ’s gospel to the end of time. Almost every impostor who has come into the world has aimed principally at the rich, and the mighty, and the respectable…Few of them thought it worth their while to address themselves to those who have been most wickedly called “the swinish multitude,” and to speak to them the glorious things of the gospel of Christ. But it is one delightful mark of Christ’s dispensation, that He aims first at the poor. “The poor have the gospel preached to them.” It was wise in Him to do so. If we would set fire to a building, it is best to light it at the basement; so our Saviour, when He would save a world, and convert men of all classes, and all ranks, begins at the lowest rank, that the fire may burn upwards, knowing right well that what was received by the poor, will ultimately by His grace be received by the rich also. Nevertheless, He chose this to be given to His disciples, and to be the mark of His gospel-“The poor have the gospel preached to them.”
I pray God to give to our ministers zeal and earnestness, that they may take the gospel into the streets, highways and byeways, and compel the people to come in, that the house may be filled. Oh, that God would give us this characteristic mark of His precious grace, that the poor might have the gospel preached unto them!~ C.H. Spurgeon
https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0114.cfm
Give to the Poor
“Give, and it will be given to you: good measure, pressed down, shaken together, and running over will be put into your bosom. For with the same measure that you use, it will be measured back to you.” – Luke 6:38
Many a man has lost his wealth by God’s righteous judgment for his misuse of it. Thou art God’s steward, wilt thou cheat Him? He has given thee His wealth to distribute to the poor; wilt thou not supply their needs out of what He hath given thee? Yes, surely thou wilt; I cannot believe thou wilt turn them away, so long as thou hast aught wherewith to relieve them, but wilt share what thou hast with them. Remember, if thou dost not relieve them, thou givest great and grave suspicion that thou lovest not Christ, for if ye love not Christ’s people, how can it be that ye are His disciples, since it is the mark, “By this shall all men know that ye are My disciples, if ye love one another;” and how can ye love, where ye have, and give not where God hath made you rich, and yet you do not bestow? Gravely ye give cause to doubt that the love of God is in you, if the love of the brethren is not in you also. Oh! remember, when thou givest, God can give thee more. Thou hast lost nothing! thou hast put it in another purse, and God may hand it back to thee in larger measure yet. Men lose nothing by what they give to God’s saints. It would often be a heavenly investment if they bestowed it upon God’s family; but if they retain it, God hath other means to make them poor if they will not give to His cause. John Bunyan tells of a man who had a roll of cloth, and the more he cut from it, the more he had; and he says, in his rhyming way,-
“A man there was, though some did count him mad,
The more he cast away, the more he had.”
He was not much of a madman, after all, if he had more the more he gave away. ~ C.H. Spurgeon
https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0099.cfm
Remember the Poor
They desired only that we should remember the poor, the very thing which I also was eager to do. – Galatians 2:10
“Remember the poor;” that word “remember” is a very comprehensive word.
We ought to remember the poor in our prayers. I need not remind you to offer supplication for the rich, but remember the poor; remember them and pray that God would comfort and cheer them in all the trials of their penury, that He would supply their wants out of the riches of His fullness. Let the angel touch you on the arm, when you have nearly finished your prayer, and say, “Remember the poor; remember the poor of the flock.” Let your prayers always go up to heaven for them.
Remember the poor, too, in your conversation. It is remarkable that all of us remember the rich… You see a man respectable in church; you always know him, don’t you? You are on the exchange, or walking down the street; you never find any difficulty in recognising him. Somehow or other, your memory is very treacherous in remembering the poor, but very strong in remembering a rich man. Let me remind you to “Remember the poor.” It is singular enough that there is no command to remember the rich; I suppose because there is no necessity for it, for we usually remember them. But there is a command for us to remember the poor. ~ C.H. Spurgeon
https://www.blueletterbible.org/Comm/spurgeon_charles/sermons/0099.cfm
He Hath Said 